by KG MacGregor
She wasn’t about to waste the evening waiting for Trey. She and Carly had too few opportunities to be together as it was, what with her leaving in a couple of weeks. They were both determined to make the most of their time together, and tonight, that would mean cuddling and talking in front of the fire.
The phone rang as she finished, and her first thought was of her new lover.
"Hello...Trey." Finally. "Of course you can come over. It’s time we talked about some things…." She bristled at her son’s words. "It so happens that I am alone…But I won’t have you dictate to me who comes and goes in my house. Is that clear?"
Her hands were shaking when she returned the phone to its cradle.
"It’s crunch time, Justine. You’ve got to hold your ground."
**********
Carly hurried to her room to pick up her cell phone, smiling at once when she recognized the number. "Hello?"
"Hi, beautiful."
"Mmm…I think you’ve got the wrong number. You meant to dial Justine Hall."
"No, I meant to dial you."
Justine explained that her son was on his way over, and that she would call when he left.
Carly started back down the hall, on her way to tell her mom that she might be out "late"
again.
But the ringing phone called her back one more time. Carly expected it to be Justine again, but it flashed Daniel’s ID instead. He probably was calling to pump her for details on her evening with Justine.
"Hello…oh, no!" The smile left her face at once. "Daniel, I’m so sorry. Please tell Rich that I’m so sorry."
**********
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Justine jumped off the couch in the living room to greet her son, who was coming in the front door. She missed the old days, when you couldn’t sneak up on somebody in a Volkswagen Beetle. Their distinct putter could be heard a block away.
"Trey?" When she entered the foyer, she was surprised and disappointed to see that Melissa had come along.
"Mom." His face was drawn and serious, but he didn’t seem angry.
"Hello, Melissa."
"Hi, Mrs. Hall." The name thing was confusing to everybody, even Justine. Mrs. Hall was her mother, but Miss Hall was that debutante that married JT Sharpe. And the folks in Leland had no use for the word Ms.
"Won’t you both come in? Would you like a Coke or something?"
Trey shook his head and looked at his girlfriend, who also declined. Together, they went into the living room and sat together on the couch, where they avoided meeting her eye.
Justine really didn’t want to have this conversation with Melissa present, but it was clear that Trey did. Obviously, he had shared all the details with her; maybe she was here to back him up.
"Did you want to talk about something, Trey?"
The teenager took his girlfriend’s hand and looked at her. "Melissa’s going to have a baby."
Oh, my…you didn’t just…I don’t think I…Jesus Christ and all the saints! On the outside, Justine sat perfectly still, her face not giving away her emotions. Elsewhere, she was experiencing a full body response. Her stomach dropped; her throat closed; her mouth went dry; her eyes glazed over; and her tongue went numb.
"We found out for sure last week…that Friday when I was supposed to be at the nursing home."
"Have you…told your father?"
Trey shook his head. "We haven’t told anybody."
"Not your parents either, Melissa?"
The young girl shook her head, unable to hold back the tears that now poured down her face. "They’re going to kill me."
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Justine got up and hurried to the couch, wrapping both her arms around the crying teenager, resting one hand on her son’s shoulder. "No, they won’t, honey. They’ll be surprised…," blown away, flabbergasted, aged twenty years, "but they love you. It’s going to be okay."
The mother’s words of assurance weren’t enough to stem the tide of tears. "No, they won’t. They’ll make me have an abortion."
"Shhh…It’ll be all right." For Justine, this was all a matter of what Melissa wanted.
Everybody could put their two cents in the bucket, but no one but Melissa had the right to decide. "Have you seen a doctor?"
The girl shook her head.
"Are you sure you’re pregnant?"
Melissa nodded. "I missed my period…and we took one of those tests."
She was probably right, Justine thought; but she still needed to see a doctor soon. "I’m going to make an appointment for you to see Dr. Coulter at the hospital tomorrow. I’ll go with you if you want me to, or I’ll just show you where to go."
"Everybody’ll find out!"
"No, they won’t. Just come to my office and we’ll go upstairs the back way. And I promise you that no one there will say anything."
Melissa nodded and tried to smile.
"Have you two…thought about what you want to do?"
"We want to get married," Trey answered without hesitation.
"Melissa?"
"Yes, we love each other and that’s what we want." She squeezed her boyfriend’s hand and gave him an almost desperate look.
"And I’ll get a job. I can go to college later…get a scholarship or something. But we’ll need money for the baby."
"Trey, I’d like to call your father and ask him to come over. Is that okay?"
"What do you think Dad’s going to say?"
"I don’t know, honey. But he loves you as much as I do, and that’s more than you can imagine."
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"Even now?"
Justine smiled at her son. "I think there’s a hormone or something that…makes a mother love her children more…right when they need it the most."
Trey looked like he might cry too. He and Melissa had been so stressed out for the past ten days that they had hardly slept or ate. "Thanks, Mom."
Justine phoned her ex-husband from the kitchen. "Trey’s here. I need you to come over…Right now…Drop it. You need to come right now."
An hour later, they had it all sorted out…subject to Walton and Millie Chandler’s input.
Both of the kids were going to finish high school, no matter what. In August, Trey would start college at UK as planned, but he would continue to live in Leland and drive the forty minutes each way to class. JT would pay his tuition and fees as planned, and they would live with Justine.
Melissa’s plans for college were on hold for now; but JT and Justine promised to help with that down the road if necessary.
Next week, JT and Trey would start work on Justine’s basement, turning what had been the kids’ rec room into an efficiency apartment. A job after school was a good idea for Trey, they agreed, more befitting a married man and father-to-be than video games with his friends. That might help convince Melissa’s parents that the kids were serious about this, and deserved all the help they could get.
The last hurdle for now would be getting Walton and Millie to sign off on the marriage of their minor daughter. If they refused, it would only be symbolic, since Melissa would turn eighteen in early March and would then be able to marry on her own. Justine and JT
would give their approval right away to Trey, who was three weeks shy of adulthood.
"Are you sure you don’t want your mother to come with you tomorrow?" If it were Emmy, Justine knew she would want to be there for her daughter.
Melissa shook her head. She was terrified of her mother. "Will you go with me?"
"Of course."
JT addressed his son. "You need to be with Melissa when she tells her parents. And don’t be surprised if they get pretty upset. This isn’t what they planned for her, and they’re probably going to say that it’s all your fault."
"It is all my fault. I should have…been more careful."
"It’s not just your fault, Trey," Melissa said.
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"But I…I want to show your mom and dad that I can take care of you, and…this isn’t a very good start."
Justine had probably never been more proud of her son that she was right that minute. It was going to be a tough row for them to hoe, but she and JT would lend them all the help they could. All four of them walked to the door together, and the kids put on their coats.
"We’ll all get through this. Call me first thing tomorrow at work, and I’ll tell you what time to come in."
When the door closed behind the kids, Justine turned and pounded her forehead against her ex-husband’s chest. "Oh, my god, JT!"
"Oh, my god, Justine!"
Chapter 21
"This row of buttons is for the size. We’re pretty simple here…we use common words, like small, medium, and large." Nadine Griffin had volunteered to come in and work with her daughter in the coffee house for the next few days while Daniel helped Rich over the loss of his father. Carly was showing her how to operate the cash register.
"Why do I have to punch in what they give me? I’m not stupid. I know how to make change."
"All the new cash registers do it, Mama. No one thinks you’re stupid."
The back door opened and the vendor entered with fresh pastries and biscottis, which Nadine began to put away.
Carly checked her supplies in the cooler under the counter, running back to the stockroom to get a few extra things. On her third trip, she laid the store key on the counter. "Will you take these and go unlock the door?"
"There’s somebody now."
Darlene Johnston was peering through the glass door, and hurried in out of the cold as soon as it was open. "Good morning." Immediately, she noticed that Daniel wasn’t there.
"Oh, no. It happened?"
"Yesterday afternoon."
"That’s so sad. So you’re going to run the store?"
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"Yeah, for a couple of days."
Darlene gave her order to Carly and paid Nadine. "Hey, you know what? People think so much of Daniel. I’m going to put a few dollars in this mug…Do you have a pen I can use?" Darlene scratched out a note explaining that Daniel had a death in the family, and that this was a flower fund. "I’ll pick this up tomorrow and send some flowers from everybody at the coffee house."
"That’s really nice, Darlene." Carly continued to be amazed at the way this town had changed…because the people in it had changed.
The first couple of hours were kind of slow, since most of the downtown stores and offices didn’t open until nine. Daniel said he did a lot of ordering of supplies in the morning. This was something she couldn’t do, but Daniel said he would come by to take care of it when he got a chance.
"So I thought you were going to go out last night," Nadine said, a hint of teasing in her voice.
"Something came up for Justine…and one of her kids." Carly was floored by the news when Justine called, but she had to admit selfishly that she was glad their embrace in the hallway hadn’t been the big issue after all. "And since I had to get up so early…." I didn’t think I should sleep over. God, it was embarrassing talking to your mother about these things!
Fortunately for Carly, the morning rush started, and she didn’t have to answer any more pointed questions about her love life…though she hadn’t exactly confessed to having a love life, per se. Her mama and daddy knew that she’d stayed over at Justine’s a couple of times, and that they’d spent a lot of time together. But other than a few words here and there, she hadn’t told them that she was in love. It would be nice to share something like that with her folks. They never met Isabel…and they never liked Alison. News that she and Justine were in love would make both of them very happy, especially if it meant she’d be coming back to Leland every chance she could.
**********
Justine stood at Melissa’s shoulder holding her hand while Dr. Brian Coulter performed the pelvic exam. All the tests confirmed her status, and Dr. Coulter set her due date at the end of July.
When they returned to Justine’s office, Melissa could barely contain her tears.
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"Sweetheart, listen." Her future mother-in-law guided her to a chair in the file room and handed her a cold drink of water from the office cooler. "You and Trey want this baby.
Right?"
The teenager nodded.
"Then it’s time to be happy. It’s going to start growing soon, and your body’s going to change a lot. And we all want a healthy baby, so you’re going to have to take good care of yourself. If you and Trey are staying at my house, I’ll make sure you eat right, and you have to get plenty of rest after school. But it’s a happy time, Melissa."
In the span of twenty-four hours, Justine had gone from wishing her son would break up with this girl to total acceptance of her as part of the family. Melissa Chandler was the girl–the young woman–that her son wanted to marry, and she would be the mother of his child. That put Justine squarely on her side.
**********
"What are you up to, Grandma?"
Justine groaned into the phone. "I am much too young for this…or maybe I’m too old for this."
"How did it go today?"
Justine told Carly a little about Melissa’s visit to the hospital, and about the kids’ plan to tell the Chandlers this evening. "I’m sort of expecting a call in a little while."
"Okay…I’ll let you go. I need to get to bed early anyway." Carly chuckled. "Mama’s already asleep."
"Carly, you’re a good person to help Daniel out like this."
"I’ve actually had a lot of fun down there…I mean, not this time, with Rich’s dad dying.
But I’ve enjoyed helping out. Everybody who comes in is really nice. Makes me wish I didn’t have to leave in a couple of weeks. I’m really going to miss that."
"And I’m going to miss you!"
Carly sighed. "I’ll miss you too, Justine."
"You know, this craziness is going to settle down in a couple of days, and when it does, I have plans for you."
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"Oh, yeah? Do any of them involve…chocolate sauce?"
Justine laughed heartily. "I’m thinking the whole banana split, honey!"
**********
This night, Justine was called to the Sharpe home, where she walked into the kitchen to find J2 holding an icepack to Trey’s swollen eye. JT was storming around the room, shouting into the phone.
"And if you ever lay another hand on my son, I’ll see to it that he’s driving that car of yours." JT was a good enough litigator to make that guarantee.
Justine kissed her son’s forehead and held out her hand for the phone.
"Walton? Justine Hall. Would you mind putting Millie on the phone for me?" She looked back over at her son’s shiner and shook her head. "Hello, Millie. It’s Justine Hall. How’s Melissa feeling this evening?" Justine wanted to remind the other mother that she had a job, and that was taking care of her daughter. "It’s just that I was a little worried about her earlier today. You remember how overwhelming all this can be even in the best of circumstances…No, it isn’t the way we would have preferred, either, but it’s what we got. And it’s all about them now, not us. They love each other, and I think we ought to do everything we can to help them be happy."
The family watched, impressed with the way Justine was handling Melissa’s angry mother.
"You really don’t have any cards to play here, Millie…It doesn’t matter. She’ll be eighteen in three months and they’ll do it then." Justine rolled her eyes as she listened to Millie’s indignant rant about what might happen if Melissa went against their wishes.
"Look, if you want to risk losing your daughter for good, that’s up to you. But don’t you worry about Melissa. JT and I are going to stand by both of them, and if Melissa needs a mother through any of this, she’ll have me." That did i
t.
Trey was on his feet to stand by his mother.
"I’m thinking New Year’s Eve at the Methodist Church…seven o’clock. Does that work for you and Walton?" Without looking up, she reached out an arm and pulled her son close. "I’ll call Reverend Scott here in a minute and let you know."
She hung up the phone and looked around at everyone. "So…ya’ll doing anything on Wednesday night?"
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**********
Trey walked his mom back out to her car, still smarting from his black eye, but calm inside for the first time in nearly two weeks.
"I really appreciate all of this, Mom. I’m sorry I’ve been such a…well, I’m sorry I’ve let you and Dad down."
"Honey, you get to start over with a clean slate right now. It’s not going to be easy, but you have to be a man now. And it’s not what your dad and I think that matters anymore."
"I know."
Justine opened her car door, then closed it without getting in. She’d probably never have more leverage over her son than she had right this second, and she wasn’t ashamed to use it. "Trey, we need to talk about something else…my friend, Carly."
The teenager looked away uncomfortably. He had sort of hoped all that would just go away.
Justine tipped his chin so that he’d look her in the eye. "We’re in love with each other, and she’s going to be a part of my life."
"That’s one of the things Mr. Chandler was talking about," he said meekly. "He said he didn’t want his daughter marrying into something like that."
Something like that…That arrogant snob! "Trey…I really don’t expect you to be able to understand why I am the way I am. To tell you the truth, I’ve had a little trouble with it myself, but I know that it’s what’s right for me. I hope you can come through for me on this. Carly Griffin is important to me, and that’s something that I need, just like your father needs J2…and you need Melissa."
